Hyperlocal News and Wallyhood

We read with interest yesterday’s New York Times on “Hyperlocal News” (‘Hyperlocal’ Web Sites Deliver News Without Newspapers). It addresses how small blogs and web sites are supplanting traditional newspapers, providing a level of focus that traditional newspapers never could, by covering the minutia of neighborhood life. Sound familiar?

We were disappointed, though, that the focus of the article was big start-ups like Everyblock and Outside.in, which are nationally scoped companies that are trying to tackle “hyperlocal” news. Isn’t that something of an oxymoron?

One of the most ambitious hyperlocal sites is EveryBlock, a six-person start-up in an office building in Chicago overlooking noisy El tracks, which is stitching together this hyperlocal future one city at a time. Backed by a $1.1 million grant from the Knight Foundation, it has created sites for 11 American cities, including New York, Seattle, Chicago and San Francisco.

It fills those sites with links to news articles and posts from local bloggers, along with data feeds from city governments, with crime reports, restaurant inspections, and notices of road construction and film shoots.

Perhaps this is the future of news, but it would be unfortunate. We’re much more enamored of the model set by the West Seattle Blog, a wife and husband team living in West Seattle who have made a full-time job out of covering the goings-on of West Seattle, by the Capitol Hill blog, a truly community-driven site that anyone can post to at will and by the good folks at Phinneywood, MyBallard and LaurelPost, residents covering their neighborhoods.

Wallyhood isn’t backed by any $1.1 million grant from the Knight Foundation, but we think we’re doing a pretty good job of helping people learn what’s going on in their neighborhood.Our goal: make Wallingford feel small.

On that note, we’re beginning to explore the idea of allowing Wallingford businesses to advertise on Wallyhood. We’d like to stay away from Google ads and huge lists of sponsors, and would instead like to find a half dozen sponsors who share our vision. More on this shortly, but if you’re interested, please drop us a line.